Friday, 7 November 2014

B

ack this week but with a reduced blog – our apologies for that, but we’re
currently working to a one week at a time agenda.

The main development since our last blog was the selection
of the Daily Telegraph's Head of Technology, Matthew Warman, as the prospective parliamentary Conservative candidate for
Boston and Skegness at next May’s general election.

His move up now makes him Matthew WarmUPman for the Tories – and unless
something earth shattering occurs, most likely the next MP for the area.

We are pleasantly surprised by the choice.

Whilst any one of the four shortlisted candidates would have
been a fresh face, Mr Warman has – to us at any rate – the added advantage of
being fresher than the rest.

As we pointed out recently, a couple of the hopefuls had
already been defeated in another constituency, whilst two of them had then gone
on to try persuading local Tories elsewhere that they were the best person to
be the future MP for Wherevertown.

It seems reasonable to assume that had Mr Warman not cleared
his first hurdle so successfully, he would have gone on to try for a seat
elsewhere – but perhaps what convinced the pitiful attendance at the “US style
Open Primary” was that he had ties to the area through his in-laws which
persuaded the 81 people who attended that he was the best man for the job.

In fact the gig was down to 80 votes by the time the first
pair of contenders was sieved out – and tied on the choice between Mr Warman
and a former Spalding headmaster who was
“looking to return to his home county” after a career move which saw him
teaching in London.

That’s understandable.

At the outset, fifteen wannabes had thrown their names into
the hat – but a number clearly were not worth the time of day.

Now, it’s down to Mr Warman to make his mark in the six
months available to him.

Doubtless since his appointment he has been besieged by fair
weather friends who believe that getting on his right side and staying
there will give them some shred of influence if he makes the journey to
Westminster.

***

S

adly, the Peter Paine sports hall was not the best place to
host the event.

We’ve had the dubious pleasure of attending an election
count or two there over the years, and whilst it’s ok for that, it’s simply not
the sort of place to stage something like the recent candidate selection.

We referred recently to the wretched turnout for the primary
at Clacton
– despite the public appeal of being both highly controversial and of national
interest.

Despite that, only 240 of the 67,000 eligible voters
registered to attend.

At the last count – and the number will surely now be
significantly higher – the electorate for Boston and Skegness was 71,003.

A turnout in Boston of 81 represented just 0.11%

Who says that people aren’t interested in politics these
days?

What on earth the candidates must have made of it is
anyone’s guess.

One person who went along described what we expected would
be the scene, a cheerless, cold venue, background noise – and disgracefully, no
microphone available for the speakers.

The outcome was largely determined by the great and the good
of the local Conservative Association, and therefore could comfortably have
been staged at the Conservative Club as it always has been before.

All the waffle now is about how Boston is looking forward – but
where else is there to look?

***

T

he run up to next year’s general election is taking on the
shape of a long running soap opera.

Prior to Mr Warman’s selection, Labour chose former mayor
Paul Kenny to stand again – his third crack at the job.

UKIP will pick its candidate on November 13th – and sensibly, given that the controversial
former Tory MP now UKIP deputy chairman Neil Hamilton is said to be in contention – will be staging
a private, members-only event.

So far the only other interested party is Paul Wooding, who
is making his presence felt on social media – whilst Mr Hamilton seems
strangely silent. There’s a first!

***

S

hortly after the Conservative announcement, the monthly prediction by Electoral
Calculus appeared, and showed
that an averaging of the seven opinion
polls published last month showed the Conservatives on 32% (+1), Labour with
33% (-3), the Lib Dems struggling on an unchanged 8% and UKIP with 18% (+3).

The new national prediction is that Labour will be 24 seats
short of a majority, winning 302 seats (-44 seats since 27 September.)

***

T

here’s been a spot of eye trouble among our glorious leaders
in the past couple of weeks.

The first outbreak came in Big Boston Borough Boss Bedford’s
monthly Conservative party political column kindly donated by the Boston Standard.

If you missed it – don't fret ... there will be another chance to read it, we are sure, most probably in the February 2015 issue of Simply Boston.

Even though the duration of the Haven Bridge cycle path road
works was declared at the time they were announced, the leader told us with what gave
an impression of prescience: “Roadworks which have caused frustrating traffic
delays in Boston will soon be at an end.

“I lobbied Lincolnshire County Council’s highways executive member and
agreement was obtained for work over the final two weeks of the project to be
carried out overnight.”

No light being hidden under any bushels there, then.

But what tribute to our dynamic and far-sighted leader that
after all the adverse publicity, badmouthing of the county council highways
staff and an absolute onslaught of public outrage, all it apparently took was one
snap of the fingers from the Respected and Beloved Leader and the
County Hall Highwaymen mounted their steeds and fled.

What a shame that Councillor Bedford’s appreciation of the
problem hadn’t kicked in a little earlier, and thus perhaps spared us a couple
more weeks of disastrous traffic chaos.

Still, you can’t have everything, and we have Councillor
Bedford.

***

T

he second spate of eye trouble came from the portfolio
holder whom we recently remarked was often confused with a Time Lord – because whenever
Councillor Stephen Woodliffe’s name was uttered, people invariably responded
“Councillor Who?”

In its unceasingly futile attempts to stop people drinking
in public areas in Boston – which have consistently failed because no-one is
ever there to enforce them – the council is grasping yet another straw and
consulting on the creation of a Public Space Protection Order … which will be
just as toothless if no one follows it though.

Step up Councillor Woodliffe.

“Drinking alcohol in our town will not be tolerated, it
is not acceptable to me and more importantly it’s not acceptable to our
residents’” said the portfolio holder for community safety.

We’re glad that he got his priorities right – but if it’s
more important to our residents, then they should have been given first
mention.

A comment like this is just one step up from another favourite
among some of our local councillors – to refer to the people who elected them
as “the public” … which make them sound like some lower life form.

And we well remember the days when many of these so-called
“public servants” would brandish their civic titles around like a club to get
their own way. Fortunately, there are only a handful of these dinosaurs left in
Worst Street.

Given his stance on street drinking, we were amused to note
that one anagram of Councillor Woodliffe’s name is: “He Pelted Off Winos.”

***

C

ouncillor Woodliffe was again in the van in the first issue
of this week’s Boston Daily Bore,
beneath the headline “Council CCTV helps trap dangerous gunman.”

The gist of the story was that Boston’s CCTV cameras did
exactly what they were designed for – which was to “capture an image” showing
which way an “armed robber” was escaping.

Councillor Woodliffe, told us: “Incidents such as this prove
the worth of our investment in our CCTV system.

“Residents can be assured that our cameras watching over
them are only ever a force for good – whether it is spotting those who
deliberately spoil the environment with litter or helping apprehend dangerous
criminals, such as in this case.

“I am pleased that we have played our part in helping put
away a dangerous man for a long time. Residents can be assured that we are there
to preserve their safety.”

Fine words – but as has been said so many times before, CCTV
cameras only play a role after a crime has been committed –
and in this case their participation was no more than we have the right to
expect of a system costing almost a quarter of a million pounds.

Whilst the robbery in Boston which the “dangerous gunman”
was fleeing was undoubtedly an ordeal for those involved, Monday’s story fails
to mention that when finally brought before the court the man was convicted on
four charges of robbery and four counts of possession of an “imitation firearm” and so
was not as dangerous as he may have appeared.

However, as an old editor of ours was fond of saying – “never let the facts get in the way of a good
story.”

***

A

nd it was helpful to be reminded of the role that the
cameras play in naming and shaming people who drop litter willy-nilly around
the town.

After the latest annual publication of miscreants’ photos
providing easy fillers for the local “newspapers” the silence is ominous.
As usual, there are no reports of fines or court appearances.

Just the usual litter of rhetoric.

***

C

ertainly, the police have embraced some new powers with
startling enthusiasm once the Anti-Social Behaviour Crime and Policing Act 2014
came into force on October 20th.
Within days, they were “tackling” anti-social behaviour in the park named after nursing pioneer Dame Sarah
Swift in Kirton – buttressed up with 48 hours’ worth of “dispersal powers” to
make scoundrels over the age of ten leave the area during that
period.

The police reported that despite “extensive” patrols no
one was found to be causing problems or dispersed.

But no doubt a grand weekend’s worth of double time was accumulated.

***

B

oston Borough Council’s ceaseless search for recognition has
prompted us to consider the authority for a special Boston Eye award.

Not for the first time, the council’s Daily Drone tested the limits of our patience with its obsession
with using playground prurience to capture our attention – and doubtless utter
a muffled snigger or two as well.

The headline: “Do you know what is OK to put down your loo? Poo,
pee and toilet paper… to be blunt!” was by our reckoning the fourth use
of such immature euphemisms in recent times.

Last month we also had the naming and shaming (with no
effect as usual) of people photographed after “peeing in the street.”
Then before that there was the gating of a public lane as part of a “No
pee, no poo, no go!” campaign. We have also seen the introduction of daily
cleaning of Hatters Lane to try to prevent similar problems – but this time
they were couched in grown up language, rather than that of the playground.
Then last year we had a “polite” campaign headlined “Please... don’t
pee here” following a spate of incontinence in Archers Lane.

Whilst this sort of misbehaviour is unpleasant, even worse
is the incessant drawing of attention to it in silly ways that surely must
sound warnings to anyone trying to find
out what sort of place Boston might be to visit or move to.

Currently a search of the internet depicts Boston not as a
halfway decent market town, but a place where … as you try to dodge the
meanderings of drunken citizens, you risk measuring your length on the pavement
after slipping in a heap of their carelessly discarded dung.

Accordingly, we are awarding Boston Borough Council the
highly prized “Golden Turd” award.

It will be accompanied by an inscribed piece of vellum bearing
the opening verse of the famous Flanders and Swann ditty: “P** P* B**** B**
D******”

***

As Michael Flanders commented in the preamble to the song,
which first appeared more than half a century ago: “I take it that all of us
are in favour of freedom of speech, provided it's not calculated to change our
western way of thought…

“You can say things in public that you would hesitate to say
in private. These four letter words and so on. I am very much opposed to this.
There are very few of these four letter words left. If they all come into
common use, we shall have nothing left for special occasions. Still, we feel
that the time has perhaps come for us to take our stand on the somewhat polluted
beaches of the nouvelle vague, to say goodbye to mealy-mouthed hypocrisy, which
has served us so well for so long, and come right out with something adult,
fearless and forthright.

“And filthy.”

So here's the certificate ...

***

F

inally, at this point we would like to thank all those
readers who e-mailed to wish us well after last week’s absence.

However, as no-one did, that won’t be possible – but we have
to point out that the blog may become less regular in the coming weeks because of the need for treatments every three weeks for the next six
months.

Our apologies for this, but we will do our best to continue
bringing you the only truly independent path through Boston’s political morass.

Having spent a lifetime working with words, we fail to comprehend the logic of pairing the word “chemo” with the word “therapy.”

Any enlightenment would be appreciated.

You can write to us at boston.eye@googlemail.com Your
e-mails will be treated in confidence and published anonymously if requested.

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About the author

is written and edited by retired Lincolnshire born writer and broadcaster Malcolm Swire, who was brought up in London, where he began his career in journalism.
In the 1960s he joined the Boston Standard before returning to London to write for the UK’s national news agency, the Press Association – then based in Fleet Street.
He returned to Lincolnshire –where his family history goes back more than a century – in various public relations roles, before becoming a founder member of BBC Radio Lincolnshire,where he created the station's Go for Gold appeal,which raised hundreds of thousands of pounds for local charities.
Over the years, he read the news, presented programmes and retired from the BBC as the station's Programme Organiser and Deputy Managing Editor.
He started the Boston Eye blog in February 2007 and has vowed to continue until Boston Borough Council's leadership is all that it should be!
He has dug in for a long wait!